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  • Chris Hedges: The Enemy From Within
    April 30, 2023

    You Are What They Eat – by Mr. Fish
    By Chris Hedges / Original to ScheerPost

    America is a stratocracy, a form of government dominated by the military. It is axiomatic among the two ruling parties that there must be a constant preparation for war. The war machine’s massive budgets are sacrosanct. Its billions of dollars in waste and fraud are ignored. Its military fiascos in Southeast Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East have disappeared into the vast cavern of historical amnesia. This amnesia, which means there is never accountability, licenses the war machine to economically disembowel the country and drive the Empire into one self-defeating conflict after another. The militarists win every election. They cannot lose. It is impossible to vote against them. The war state is a Götterdämmerung, as Dwight Macdonald writes, “without the gods.”

    Since the end of the Second World War, the federal government has spent more than half its tax dollars on past, current and future military operations. It is the largest single sustaining activity of the government. Military systems are sold before they are produced with guarantees that huge cost overruns will be covered. Foreign aid is contingent on buying U.S. weapons. Egypt, which receives some $1.3 billion in foreign military financing, is required to devote it to buying and maintaining U.S. weapons systems. Israel has received $158 billion in bilateral assistance from the U.S. since 1949, almost all of it since 1971 in the form of military aid, with most of it going towards arms purchases from U.S. weapons manufacturers. The American public funds the research, development and building of weapons systems and then buys these same weapons systems on behalf of foreign governments. It is a circular system of corporate welfare.

    Between October 2021 and September 2022, the U.S. spent $877 billion on the military, that’s more than the next 10 countries, including China, Russia, Germany, France and the United Kingdom combined. These huge military expenditures, along with the rising costs of a for-profit healthcare system, have driven the U.S. national debt to over $31 trillion, nearly $5 trillion more than the U.S.’s entire Gross Domestic Product (GDP). This imbalance is not sustainable, especially once the dollar is no longer the world’s reserve currency. As of January 2023, the U.S. spent a record $213 billion servicing the interest on its national debt.

    The public, bombarded with war propaganda, cheers on their self-immolation. It revels in the despicable beauty of our military prowess. It speaks in the thought-terminating clichés spewed out by mass culture and mass media. It imbibes the illusion of omnipotence and wallows in self-adulation.

    Support our Independent Journalism — Donate Today!

    The intoxication of war is a plague. It imparts an emotional high that is impervious to logic, reason or fact. No nation is immune. The gravest mistake made by European socialists on the eve of the First World War was the belief that the working classes of France, Germany, Italy, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Russia and Great Britain would not be divided into antagonistic tribes because of disputes between imperialist governments. They would not, the socialists assured themselves, sign on for the suicidal slaughter of millions of working men in the trenches. Instead, nearly every socialist leader walked away from their anti-war platform to back their nation’s entry into the war. The handful who did not, such as Rosa Luxemburg, were sent to prison.

    A society dominated by militarists distorts its social, cultural, economic and political institutions to serve the interests of the war industry. The essence of the military is masked with subterfuges — using the military to carry out humanitarian relief missions, evacuating civilians in danger, as we see in the Sudan, defining military aggression as “humanitarian intervention” or a way to protect democracy and liberty, or lauding the military as carrying out a vital civic function by teaching leadership, responsibility, ethics and skills to young recruits. The true face of the military — industrial slaughter — is hidden.

    The mantra of the militarized state is national security. If every discussion begins with a question of national security, every answer includes force or the threat of force. The preoccupation with internal and external threats divides the world into friend and foe, good and evil. Militarized societies are fertile ground for demagogues. Militarists, like demagogues, see other nations and cultures in their own image – threatening and aggressive. They seek only domination.

    It was not in our national interest to wage war for two decades across the Middle East. It is not in our national interest to go to war with Russia or China. But militarists need war the way a vampire needs blood.

    After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev and later Vladimir Putin lobbied to be integrated into western economic and military alliances. An alliance that included Russia would have nullified the calls to expand NATO — which the U.S. had promised it would not do beyond the borders of a unified Germany — and have made it impossible to convince countries in eastern and central Europe to spend billions on U.S. military hardware. Moscow’s requests were rebuffed. Russia was made the enemy, whether it wanted to be or not. None of this made us more secure. Washington’s decision to interfere in Ukraine’s domestic affairs by backing a coup in 2014 triggered a civil war and Russia’s subsequent invasion.

    But for those who profit from war, antagonizing Russia, like antagonizing China, is a good business model. Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin saw their stock prices increase by 40 percent and 37 percent respectively as a result of the Ukraine conflict.

    A war with China, now an industrial giant, would disrupt the global supply chain with devastating effects on the U.S. and global economy. Apple produces 90 percent of its products in China. U.S. trade with China was $690.6 billion last year. In 2004, U.S. manufacturing output was more than twice China’s. China’s output is now nearly double that of the United States. China produces the largest number of ships, steel and smartphones in the world. It dominates the global production of chemicals, metals, heavy industrial equipment and electronics. It is the world’s largest rare earth mineral exporter, its greatest reserve holder and is responsible for 80 percent of its refining worldwide. Rare earth minerals are essential to the manufacture of computer chips, smartphones, television screens, medical equipment, fluorescent light bulbs, cars, wind turbines, smart bombs, fighter jets and satellite communications.

    War with China would result in massive shortages of a variety of goods and resources, some vital to the war industry, paralyzing U.S. businesses. Inflation and unemployment would rocket upwards. Rationing would be implemented. The global stock exchanges, at least in the short term, would be shut down. It would trigger a global depression. If the U.S. Navy was able to block oil shipments to China and disrupt its sea lanes, the conflict could potentially become nuclear.

    In “NATO 2030: Unified for a New Era,” the military alliance sees the future as a battle for hegemony with rival states, especially China. It calls for the preparation of prolonged global conflict. In October 2022, Air Force General Mike Minihan, head of Air Mobility Command, presented his “Mobility Manifesto” to a packed military conference. During this unhinged fearmongering diatribe, Minihan argued that if the U.S. does not dramatically escalate its preparations for a war with China, America’s children will find themselves “subservient to a rules based order that benefits only one country [China].”

    According to the New York Times, the Marine Corps is training units for beach assaults, where the Pentagon believes the first battles with China may occur, across “the first island chain” that includes, “Okinawa and Taiwan down to Malaysia as well as the South China Sea and disputed islands in the Spratlys and the Paracels.”.

    Militarists drain funds from social and infrastructure programs. They pour money into research and development of weapons systems and neglect renewable energy technologies. Bridges, roads, electrical grids and levees collapse. Schools decay. Domestic manufacturing declines. The public is impoverished. The harsh forms of control the militarists test and perfect abroad migrate back to the homeland. Militarized Police. Militarized drones. Surveillance. Vast prison complexes. Suspension of basic civil liberties. Censorship.

    Those such as Julian Assange, who challenge the stratocracy, who expose its crimes and suicidal folly, are ruthlessly persecuted. But the war state harbors within it the seeds of its own destruction. It will cannibalize the nation until it collapses. Before then, it will lash out, like a blinded cyclops, seeking to restore its diminishing power through indiscriminate violence. The tragedy is not that the U.S. war state will self-destruct. The tragedy is that we will take down so many innocents with us.

    NOTE TO SCHEERPOST READERS FROM CHRIS HEDGES: There is now no way left for me to continue to write a weekly column for ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show without your help. The walls are closing in, with startling rapidity, on independent journalism, with the elites, including the Democratic Party elites, clamoring for more and more censorship. Bob Scheer, who runs ScheerPost on a shoestring budget, and I will not waver in our commitment to independent and honest journalism, and we will never put ScheerPost behind a paywall, charge a subscription for it, sell your data or accept advertising. Please, if you can, sign up at chrishedges.substack.com so I can continue to post my now weekly Monday column on ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show, The Chris Hedges Report.


    Chris Hedges

    Chris Hedges is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist who was a foreign correspondent for fifteen years for The New York Times, where he served as the Middle East Bureau Chief and Balkan Bureau Chief for the paper. He previously worked overseas for The Dallas Morning News, The Christian Science Monitor, and NPR. He is the host of show The Chris Hedges Report.

    He was a member of the team that won the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Reporting for The New York Times coverage of global terrorism, and he received the 2002 Amnesty International Global Award for Human Rights Journalism. Hedges, who holds a Master of Divinity from Harvard Divinity School, is the author of the bestsellers American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America, Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle and was a National Book Critics Circle finalist for his book War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning. He writes an online column for the website ScheerPost. He has taught at Columbia University, New York University, Princeton University and the University of Toronto.

    https://scheerpost.com/2023/04/30/chris-hedges-the-enemy-from-within/
    Chris Hedges: The Enemy From Within April 30, 2023 You Are What They Eat – by Mr. Fish By Chris Hedges / Original to ScheerPost America is a stratocracy, a form of government dominated by the military. It is axiomatic among the two ruling parties that there must be a constant preparation for war. The war machine’s massive budgets are sacrosanct. Its billions of dollars in waste and fraud are ignored. Its military fiascos in Southeast Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East have disappeared into the vast cavern of historical amnesia. This amnesia, which means there is never accountability, licenses the war machine to economically disembowel the country and drive the Empire into one self-defeating conflict after another. The militarists win every election. They cannot lose. It is impossible to vote against them. The war state is a Götterdämmerung, as Dwight Macdonald writes, “without the gods.” Since the end of the Second World War, the federal government has spent more than half its tax dollars on past, current and future military operations. It is the largest single sustaining activity of the government. Military systems are sold before they are produced with guarantees that huge cost overruns will be covered. Foreign aid is contingent on buying U.S. weapons. Egypt, which receives some $1.3 billion in foreign military financing, is required to devote it to buying and maintaining U.S. weapons systems. Israel has received $158 billion in bilateral assistance from the U.S. since 1949, almost all of it since 1971 in the form of military aid, with most of it going towards arms purchases from U.S. weapons manufacturers. The American public funds the research, development and building of weapons systems and then buys these same weapons systems on behalf of foreign governments. It is a circular system of corporate welfare. Between October 2021 and September 2022, the U.S. spent $877 billion on the military, that’s more than the next 10 countries, including China, Russia, Germany, France and the United Kingdom combined. These huge military expenditures, along with the rising costs of a for-profit healthcare system, have driven the U.S. national debt to over $31 trillion, nearly $5 trillion more than the U.S.’s entire Gross Domestic Product (GDP). This imbalance is not sustainable, especially once the dollar is no longer the world’s reserve currency. As of January 2023, the U.S. spent a record $213 billion servicing the interest on its national debt. The public, bombarded with war propaganda, cheers on their self-immolation. It revels in the despicable beauty of our military prowess. It speaks in the thought-terminating clichés spewed out by mass culture and mass media. It imbibes the illusion of omnipotence and wallows in self-adulation. Support our Independent Journalism — Donate Today! The intoxication of war is a plague. It imparts an emotional high that is impervious to logic, reason or fact. No nation is immune. The gravest mistake made by European socialists on the eve of the First World War was the belief that the working classes of France, Germany, Italy, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Russia and Great Britain would not be divided into antagonistic tribes because of disputes between imperialist governments. They would not, the socialists assured themselves, sign on for the suicidal slaughter of millions of working men in the trenches. Instead, nearly every socialist leader walked away from their anti-war platform to back their nation’s entry into the war. The handful who did not, such as Rosa Luxemburg, were sent to prison. A society dominated by militarists distorts its social, cultural, economic and political institutions to serve the interests of the war industry. The essence of the military is masked with subterfuges — using the military to carry out humanitarian relief missions, evacuating civilians in danger, as we see in the Sudan, defining military aggression as “humanitarian intervention” or a way to protect democracy and liberty, or lauding the military as carrying out a vital civic function by teaching leadership, responsibility, ethics and skills to young recruits. The true face of the military — industrial slaughter — is hidden. The mantra of the militarized state is national security. If every discussion begins with a question of national security, every answer includes force or the threat of force. The preoccupation with internal and external threats divides the world into friend and foe, good and evil. Militarized societies are fertile ground for demagogues. Militarists, like demagogues, see other nations and cultures in their own image – threatening and aggressive. They seek only domination. It was not in our national interest to wage war for two decades across the Middle East. It is not in our national interest to go to war with Russia or China. But militarists need war the way a vampire needs blood. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev and later Vladimir Putin lobbied to be integrated into western economic and military alliances. An alliance that included Russia would have nullified the calls to expand NATO — which the U.S. had promised it would not do beyond the borders of a unified Germany — and have made it impossible to convince countries in eastern and central Europe to spend billions on U.S. military hardware. Moscow’s requests were rebuffed. Russia was made the enemy, whether it wanted to be or not. None of this made us more secure. Washington’s decision to interfere in Ukraine’s domestic affairs by backing a coup in 2014 triggered a civil war and Russia’s subsequent invasion. But for those who profit from war, antagonizing Russia, like antagonizing China, is a good business model. Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin saw their stock prices increase by 40 percent and 37 percent respectively as a result of the Ukraine conflict. A war with China, now an industrial giant, would disrupt the global supply chain with devastating effects on the U.S. and global economy. Apple produces 90 percent of its products in China. U.S. trade with China was $690.6 billion last year. In 2004, U.S. manufacturing output was more than twice China’s. China’s output is now nearly double that of the United States. China produces the largest number of ships, steel and smartphones in the world. It dominates the global production of chemicals, metals, heavy industrial equipment and electronics. It is the world’s largest rare earth mineral exporter, its greatest reserve holder and is responsible for 80 percent of its refining worldwide. Rare earth minerals are essential to the manufacture of computer chips, smartphones, television screens, medical equipment, fluorescent light bulbs, cars, wind turbines, smart bombs, fighter jets and satellite communications. War with China would result in massive shortages of a variety of goods and resources, some vital to the war industry, paralyzing U.S. businesses. Inflation and unemployment would rocket upwards. Rationing would be implemented. The global stock exchanges, at least in the short term, would be shut down. It would trigger a global depression. If the U.S. Navy was able to block oil shipments to China and disrupt its sea lanes, the conflict could potentially become nuclear. In “NATO 2030: Unified for a New Era,” the military alliance sees the future as a battle for hegemony with rival states, especially China. It calls for the preparation of prolonged global conflict. In October 2022, Air Force General Mike Minihan, head of Air Mobility Command, presented his “Mobility Manifesto” to a packed military conference. During this unhinged fearmongering diatribe, Minihan argued that if the U.S. does not dramatically escalate its preparations for a war with China, America’s children will find themselves “subservient to a rules based order that benefits only one country [China].” According to the New York Times, the Marine Corps is training units for beach assaults, where the Pentagon believes the first battles with China may occur, across “the first island chain” that includes, “Okinawa and Taiwan down to Malaysia as well as the South China Sea and disputed islands in the Spratlys and the Paracels.”. Militarists drain funds from social and infrastructure programs. They pour money into research and development of weapons systems and neglect renewable energy technologies. Bridges, roads, electrical grids and levees collapse. Schools decay. Domestic manufacturing declines. The public is impoverished. The harsh forms of control the militarists test and perfect abroad migrate back to the homeland. Militarized Police. Militarized drones. Surveillance. Vast prison complexes. Suspension of basic civil liberties. Censorship. Those such as Julian Assange, who challenge the stratocracy, who expose its crimes and suicidal folly, are ruthlessly persecuted. But the war state harbors within it the seeds of its own destruction. It will cannibalize the nation until it collapses. Before then, it will lash out, like a blinded cyclops, seeking to restore its diminishing power through indiscriminate violence. The tragedy is not that the U.S. war state will self-destruct. The tragedy is that we will take down so many innocents with us. NOTE TO SCHEERPOST READERS FROM CHRIS HEDGES: There is now no way left for me to continue to write a weekly column for ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show without your help. The walls are closing in, with startling rapidity, on independent journalism, with the elites, including the Democratic Party elites, clamoring for more and more censorship. Bob Scheer, who runs ScheerPost on a shoestring budget, and I will not waver in our commitment to independent and honest journalism, and we will never put ScheerPost behind a paywall, charge a subscription for it, sell your data or accept advertising. Please, if you can, sign up at chrishedges.substack.com so I can continue to post my now weekly Monday column on ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show, The Chris Hedges Report. Chris Hedges Chris Hedges is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist who was a foreign correspondent for fifteen years for The New York Times, where he served as the Middle East Bureau Chief and Balkan Bureau Chief for the paper. He previously worked overseas for The Dallas Morning News, The Christian Science Monitor, and NPR. He is the host of show The Chris Hedges Report. He was a member of the team that won the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Reporting for The New York Times coverage of global terrorism, and he received the 2002 Amnesty International Global Award for Human Rights Journalism. Hedges, who holds a Master of Divinity from Harvard Divinity School, is the author of the bestsellers American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America, Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle and was a National Book Critics Circle finalist for his book War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning. He writes an online column for the website ScheerPost. He has taught at Columbia University, New York University, Princeton University and the University of Toronto. https://scheerpost.com/2023/04/30/chris-hedges-the-enemy-from-within/
    SCHEERPOST.COM
    Chris Hedges: The Enemy From Within
    The war industry, a state within a state, disembowels the nation, stumbles from one military fiasco to the next, strips us of civil liberties and pushes us towards suicidal wars with Russia and Chi…
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  • BDS is the most effective way to put our solidarity into action – here’s how to win
    Olivia KatbiNovember 13, 2023
    (Image: Palestinian BDS National Committee)
    (Image: Palestinian BDS National Committee)
    As Israel continues to escalate its ongoing genocide and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, a new wave of solidarity with Palestine is emerging. Many people are learning for the first time about the Palestinian call to boycott, divest from, and sanction (BDS) Israel until it complies with international law. As a coordinator for the BDS Movement in North America for several years, I have worked on a number of BDS campaigns, and would like to lay out the basics, best practices, and some helpful tips and ideas for BDS campaigning.

    BDS 101

    First, some quick background: The BDS movement was founded by Palestinian civil society in 2005 as a way to exert pressure on Israel to comply with international law until it meets three key demands:

    1. An end to Israel’s occupation of all Arab lands and dismantling the illegal apartheid Wall;

    2. Full equality for Palestinian citizens of Israel; and

    3. The right of return for Palestinian refugees.

    You can learn more about the history of the BDS Movement, the organizations that make up the Palestinian BDS National Committee, and past and current campaigns at the BDS Movement website.

    BDS is the most effective way for us to put our solidarity with Palestinian liberation into action as residents of the United States, which gives Israel an annual $3.8 billion in military funding, shields Israel from international accountability, and has countless corporations and institutions that maintain some level of complicity in Israel’s violence. BDS is inspired by the South African anti-apartheid movement, during which international boycotts and sanctions played a major role in bringing about the eventual fall of apartheid, and the U.S. Civil Rights movement and its inspiring boycotts, including the Rosa Parks-led Montgomery bus boycott.

    A movement for collective action

    Many people are personally boycotting brands that have stated support for Israel, and that’s great – but I want to stress that consumer boycotts are most effective when taken as a collective action, and BDS isn’t just about consumer boycotts. More important than our own personal investments and purchases, which are symbolic gestures but not impactful alone, is working within an organization, union, or coalition to organize effective, strategic campaigns and build power globally to support the Palestinian struggle. So when you see massive lists of dozens and dozens of companies to boycott going around on social media – please keep in mind that the goal isn’t to boycott as many companies as possible, as very few people can feasibly sustain such extensive boycotts. The goal is to strategically pick a few targets and exert enough collective pressure to win a campaign – meaning, a specific company stops doing business with Israel, a specific institution divests its investments from complicit Israeli or international companies, or a specific city ends its relationship with the Israeli government or adopts a human rights procurement and investment policy.

    There are many different kinds of BDS campaigns to choose from, and you can choose the most strategic and achievable targets in your own local context. Consider these examples:

    Municipal boycott: a city ends contracts with HP or Caterpillar.

    Academic boycott: a university (or department) or academic association ends institutional collaboration with Israeli academic institutions.

    Sports boycott: US teams refuse to play against official Israeli teams, or Israel gets suspended from the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA).

    Consumer boycott: a co-op grocery store stops selling Sabra hummus.

    Cultural boycott: a celebrity cancels a performance in Israel, or a US event by Israeli cultural ambassadors or sponsored by Israel (or anti-Palestinian lobby groups) is canceled.

    Divestment: A city, university, church, trade union, or pension fund withdraws its investments in corporations and banks complicit in Israeli apartheid.

    As the BDS movement continues to grow at a fast pace, many activists around the world, including in Palestine, often wonder what institution or corporation to most effectively target and how. Given our limited human capacity, we want to be strategic with the targets we select. The BDS movement does not actually launch a boycott campaign against every boycottable event, product or institution, because that would make it pretty impossible to achieve concrete results. To be strategic, we carefully select our targets and how we intervene in each case. To read about current BDS targets and strategic campaigning, including why some targets are “pressure” targets instead of full-on boycott targets, please take a look at this recent statement from the BDS Movement.

    When selecting a BDS target we generally recommend considering the following four criteria:


    1. The level of complicity involved: The deeper the complicity, the easier it is to mobilize support for BDS action against any given target. There are hundreds of international companies and banks that are in some way complicit. Rather than targeting any international athletic footwear company that sells athletic shoes and apparel in Israel, for example, we recommend joining the campaign against PUMA, which sponsors the Israel Football Association. The IFA governs teams in Israel’s illegal settlements on occupied Palestinian land.

    2. The potential for forming a broad, cross-movement coalition against the target: A divestment campaign targeting Chevron, for example, makes much more sense than a divestment campaign targeting a company that only infringes on Palestinian rights, because Chevron is a target of climate activists worldwide. Intersectional coalitions are especially crucial to maximize the potential of winning against large, nasty complicit corporations.

    3. Media appeal: If two companies are equally complicit, and we must choose, it is more effective to go after the more publicly recognized brand, as that usually attracts more media attention and allows us to educate and reach out to a much larger audience.

    4. Possibility of success: Even if the above three conditions are met, we don’t launch a campaign against a target unless we have a reasonable chance of success. And success can sometimes just mean reaching a wide mainstream audience and winning their support, rather than actually succeeding in canceling an event, or canceling a contract, but symbolic victories alone are not sufficient. We do BDS because we want to win, build power to affect policy change, and to achieve Palestinian rights ultimately, and not to merely score points and feel good about symbolic gestures. Only through sustained, cumulative, growing and mainstreaming successes can BDS achieve its objectives— which are freedom, justice and equality.

    Campaigning to win

    Once you and your group or organization (because you absolutely should not be doing this alone!) have carefully researched and chosen a target that makes strategic sense for your local context, don’t just jump out with a public campaign right away. Starting with a soft ask (due diligence) is an often overlooked step that can sometimes deliver us a win right away – and the goal is winning! For example, meeting with your union’s investment committee to see if they are willing to implement a human rights investment screening policy; privately writing a letter to your school’s procurement manager to see if there is another supplier of computers they could go with rather than HP; or getting grocery store workers to collectively request that the store no longer shelve an Israeli product. You might be surprised by how far good faith engagement, based on sharing accurate information and compelling moral appeals, can in some cases take you, particularly in smaller communities, before escalating to a larger public pressure campaign.

    In most cases, however, strategic pressure is the only effective way. For example, when we ran a campaign in Portland asking the Portland Trail Blazers to end their sponsorship with IDF sniper scope supplier Leupold and Stevens, we first sent private letters to the Blazers organization explaining our concerns and requesting a meeting to talk further about the partnership. This tactic did not work, and we then escalated to a public, year-long pressure campaign, which we won! But we had to make sure to do our due diligence first, as that in itself shows good faith and win over many bystanders.

    You should also begin reaching out to other organizations for endorsement and support. Coalition building is a must in most BDS work. Organizations in your area might be interested in campaigning together on the issue, and organizations in the U.S. can offer support for your campaign. For example, the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) has talented researchers with years of BDS campaigning under their belts and a great database which can help you find reliable information on companies and investment funds. Palestine Legal can help you ensure that your campaign is as legally sound as possible and may be able to help you face legal challenges that you may run into regardless. IMEU can provide resources on connecting with the media and tips on how best to integrate communications into your campaign strategy, not as an afterthought.

    Power mapping is an important part of your campaign as well – who are the decision makers, who is best placed to pressure them, and how can we most effectively do so? Do you have any allies on the inside? What kind of opposition do you think you’ll be up against, and how can you prepare for that ahead of time? Other important parts of campaigning include creating a media strategy, a public education strategy (for example, hosting informational events like teach-ins), a timeline for escalation of your campaign, and picking strategic dates for certain actions – such as delivering a petition during a board meeting of the company you’re targeting. Is peacefully disruptive direct action (sit-in, peaceful occupation, flashmob, collective supermarket action, etc.) a useful tactic to consider, at the right time, in your strategy?

    Historically, some of the biggest and most successful BDS campaigns have taken years of strategic planning, organizing, and network building to pull off – so don’t be discouraged if it doesn’t happen for you right away. It’s worth it to be intentional in your planning and outreach. But at this unprecedented time of crisis with genocide unfolding before our eyes, there’s also no reason why a BDS campaign needs to take years. There is great urgency in the work we’re doing right now, and there’s no reason why a city council or your union leadership can’t make a decision to end its complicity right now if the political will exists. If not now, when?

    The South African anti-apartheid movement organized for decades to gain broad international support leading up to the fall of apartheid; and apartheid did fall. Freedom is inevitable. The time is now to take action to join the movement for freedom, justice, and equality in Palestine.

    Before you go – we need your support

    At Mondoweiss, we understand the power of telling Palestinian stories. For 17 years, we have pushed back when the mainstream media published lies or echoed politicians’ hateful rhetoric. Now, Palestinian voices are more important than ever.

    Our traffic has increased ten times since October 7, and we need your help to cover our increased expenses.

    Support our journalists with a donation today.


    https://mondoweiss.net/2023/11/bds-is-the-most-effective-way-to-put-our-solidarity-into-action-heres-how-to-win/
    BDS is the most effective way to put our solidarity into action – here’s how to win Olivia KatbiNovember 13, 2023 (Image: Palestinian BDS National Committee) (Image: Palestinian BDS National Committee) As Israel continues to escalate its ongoing genocide and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, a new wave of solidarity with Palestine is emerging. Many people are learning for the first time about the Palestinian call to boycott, divest from, and sanction (BDS) Israel until it complies with international law. As a coordinator for the BDS Movement in North America for several years, I have worked on a number of BDS campaigns, and would like to lay out the basics, best practices, and some helpful tips and ideas for BDS campaigning. BDS 101 First, some quick background: The BDS movement was founded by Palestinian civil society in 2005 as a way to exert pressure on Israel to comply with international law until it meets three key demands: 1. An end to Israel’s occupation of all Arab lands and dismantling the illegal apartheid Wall; 2. Full equality for Palestinian citizens of Israel; and 3. The right of return for Palestinian refugees. You can learn more about the history of the BDS Movement, the organizations that make up the Palestinian BDS National Committee, and past and current campaigns at the BDS Movement website. BDS is the most effective way for us to put our solidarity with Palestinian liberation into action as residents of the United States, which gives Israel an annual $3.8 billion in military funding, shields Israel from international accountability, and has countless corporations and institutions that maintain some level of complicity in Israel’s violence. BDS is inspired by the South African anti-apartheid movement, during which international boycotts and sanctions played a major role in bringing about the eventual fall of apartheid, and the U.S. Civil Rights movement and its inspiring boycotts, including the Rosa Parks-led Montgomery bus boycott. A movement for collective action Many people are personally boycotting brands that have stated support for Israel, and that’s great – but I want to stress that consumer boycotts are most effective when taken as a collective action, and BDS isn’t just about consumer boycotts. More important than our own personal investments and purchases, which are symbolic gestures but not impactful alone, is working within an organization, union, or coalition to organize effective, strategic campaigns and build power globally to support the Palestinian struggle. So when you see massive lists of dozens and dozens of companies to boycott going around on social media – please keep in mind that the goal isn’t to boycott as many companies as possible, as very few people can feasibly sustain such extensive boycotts. The goal is to strategically pick a few targets and exert enough collective pressure to win a campaign – meaning, a specific company stops doing business with Israel, a specific institution divests its investments from complicit Israeli or international companies, or a specific city ends its relationship with the Israeli government or adopts a human rights procurement and investment policy. There are many different kinds of BDS campaigns to choose from, and you can choose the most strategic and achievable targets in your own local context. Consider these examples: Municipal boycott: a city ends contracts with HP or Caterpillar. Academic boycott: a university (or department) or academic association ends institutional collaboration with Israeli academic institutions. Sports boycott: US teams refuse to play against official Israeli teams, or Israel gets suspended from the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA). Consumer boycott: a co-op grocery store stops selling Sabra hummus. Cultural boycott: a celebrity cancels a performance in Israel, or a US event by Israeli cultural ambassadors or sponsored by Israel (or anti-Palestinian lobby groups) is canceled. Divestment: A city, university, church, trade union, or pension fund withdraws its investments in corporations and banks complicit in Israeli apartheid. As the BDS movement continues to grow at a fast pace, many activists around the world, including in Palestine, often wonder what institution or corporation to most effectively target and how. Given our limited human capacity, we want to be strategic with the targets we select. The BDS movement does not actually launch a boycott campaign against every boycottable event, product or institution, because that would make it pretty impossible to achieve concrete results. To be strategic, we carefully select our targets and how we intervene in each case. To read about current BDS targets and strategic campaigning, including why some targets are “pressure” targets instead of full-on boycott targets, please take a look at this recent statement from the BDS Movement. When selecting a BDS target we generally recommend considering the following four criteria:
 1. The level of complicity involved: The deeper the complicity, the easier it is to mobilize support for BDS action against any given target. There are hundreds of international companies and banks that are in some way complicit. Rather than targeting any international athletic footwear company that sells athletic shoes and apparel in Israel, for example, we recommend joining the campaign against PUMA, which sponsors the Israel Football Association. The IFA governs teams in Israel’s illegal settlements on occupied Palestinian land. 2. The potential for forming a broad, cross-movement coalition against the target: A divestment campaign targeting Chevron, for example, makes much more sense than a divestment campaign targeting a company that only infringes on Palestinian rights, because Chevron is a target of climate activists worldwide. Intersectional coalitions are especially crucial to maximize the potential of winning against large, nasty complicit corporations. 3. Media appeal: If two companies are equally complicit, and we must choose, it is more effective to go after the more publicly recognized brand, as that usually attracts more media attention and allows us to educate and reach out to a much larger audience. 4. Possibility of success: Even if the above three conditions are met, we don’t launch a campaign against a target unless we have a reasonable chance of success. And success can sometimes just mean reaching a wide mainstream audience and winning their support, rather than actually succeeding in canceling an event, or canceling a contract, but symbolic victories alone are not sufficient. We do BDS because we want to win, build power to affect policy change, and to achieve Palestinian rights ultimately, and not to merely score points and feel good about symbolic gestures. Only through sustained, cumulative, growing and mainstreaming successes can BDS achieve its objectives— which are freedom, justice and equality. Campaigning to win Once you and your group or organization (because you absolutely should not be doing this alone!) have carefully researched and chosen a target that makes strategic sense for your local context, don’t just jump out with a public campaign right away. Starting with a soft ask (due diligence) is an often overlooked step that can sometimes deliver us a win right away – and the goal is winning! For example, meeting with your union’s investment committee to see if they are willing to implement a human rights investment screening policy; privately writing a letter to your school’s procurement manager to see if there is another supplier of computers they could go with rather than HP; or getting grocery store workers to collectively request that the store no longer shelve an Israeli product. You might be surprised by how far good faith engagement, based on sharing accurate information and compelling moral appeals, can in some cases take you, particularly in smaller communities, before escalating to a larger public pressure campaign. In most cases, however, strategic pressure is the only effective way. For example, when we ran a campaign in Portland asking the Portland Trail Blazers to end their sponsorship with IDF sniper scope supplier Leupold and Stevens, we first sent private letters to the Blazers organization explaining our concerns and requesting a meeting to talk further about the partnership. This tactic did not work, and we then escalated to a public, year-long pressure campaign, which we won! But we had to make sure to do our due diligence first, as that in itself shows good faith and win over many bystanders. You should also begin reaching out to other organizations for endorsement and support. Coalition building is a must in most BDS work. Organizations in your area might be interested in campaigning together on the issue, and organizations in the U.S. can offer support for your campaign. For example, the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) has talented researchers with years of BDS campaigning under their belts and a great database which can help you find reliable information on companies and investment funds. Palestine Legal can help you ensure that your campaign is as legally sound as possible and may be able to help you face legal challenges that you may run into regardless. IMEU can provide resources on connecting with the media and tips on how best to integrate communications into your campaign strategy, not as an afterthought. Power mapping is an important part of your campaign as well – who are the decision makers, who is best placed to pressure them, and how can we most effectively do so? Do you have any allies on the inside? What kind of opposition do you think you’ll be up against, and how can you prepare for that ahead of time? Other important parts of campaigning include creating a media strategy, a public education strategy (for example, hosting informational events like teach-ins), a timeline for escalation of your campaign, and picking strategic dates for certain actions – such as delivering a petition during a board meeting of the company you’re targeting. Is peacefully disruptive direct action (sit-in, peaceful occupation, flashmob, collective supermarket action, etc.) a useful tactic to consider, at the right time, in your strategy? Historically, some of the biggest and most successful BDS campaigns have taken years of strategic planning, organizing, and network building to pull off – so don’t be discouraged if it doesn’t happen for you right away. It’s worth it to be intentional in your planning and outreach. But at this unprecedented time of crisis with genocide unfolding before our eyes, there’s also no reason why a BDS campaign needs to take years. There is great urgency in the work we’re doing right now, and there’s no reason why a city council or your union leadership can’t make a decision to end its complicity right now if the political will exists. If not now, when? The South African anti-apartheid movement organized for decades to gain broad international support leading up to the fall of apartheid; and apartheid did fall. Freedom is inevitable. The time is now to take action to join the movement for freedom, justice, and equality in Palestine. Before you go – we need your support At Mondoweiss, we understand the power of telling Palestinian stories. For 17 years, we have pushed back when the mainstream media published lies or echoed politicians’ hateful rhetoric. Now, Palestinian voices are more important than ever. Our traffic has increased ten times since October 7, and we need your help to cover our increased expenses. Support our journalists with a donation today. https://mondoweiss.net/2023/11/bds-is-the-most-effective-way-to-put-our-solidarity-into-action-heres-how-to-win/
    MONDOWEISS.NET
    BDS is the most effective way to put our solidarity into action – here’s how to win
    As Israel escalates its genocide in Gaza, a new wave of solidarity with Palestine is emerging. The movement to boycott, divest from, and sanction Israel is the best way to put our solidarity into action. Here is how to make your BDS campaign a success.
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  • Had a great afternoon with my Mom and sister who just got engaged! Then got to hang with more people I consider family, throw the football, toss horseshoes and hung out with one of my favorite pups, Teddy!! !
    Had a great afternoon with my Mom and sister who just got engaged! Then got to hang with more people I consider family, throw the football, toss horseshoes and hung out with one of my favorite pups, Teddy!! !
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  • Good morning!
    Don’t criticize someone, focus on your self.
    You can always take their shoes…

    “ Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you are a mile away from them and you have their shoes.” —Jack Handey
    Good morning! Don’t criticize someone, focus on your self. You can always take their shoes… “ Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you are a mile away from them and you have their shoes.” —Jack Handey
    Like
    10
    0 Comments 0 Shares 1058 Views
  • New shoes for our baby ???? patrick.habig
    New shoes for our baby ???? [patrick.habig]
    Like
    3
    0 Comments 0 Shares 991 Views